I took a day’s vacation and went in search of history. I found some. In order to get to it, I had to take a hike.
This is the view from the car, looking up to the cemetery.
I was only able to drive 1/2 way up the hill.
This is the view from the cemetery, looking back down at the car. That little gold speck in the center of the photo? That’s my car.
My replacement knee is working just fine, thank you very much. However there were some rough moments due to high pollen count and a freshly mowed field setting off an asthma attack.
I like to visit old cemeteries. The older, the better. I’ve been taking photos for an art project I have in mind, but I also like to walk through sans camera to look and wonder about the lives of those who have passed. I’m sure there’s a connection in my thinking about lives of those passed in the 1700s and 1800s, and my thinking about the life the person who wove the cloth that became the Shroud of Turin. And there’s another peek into my thought process.
However, I digress.
Back to the cemeteries. Some of the stones are no longer legible. There seems to be a trend of replacing the original marker with a spiffy new marker. I’m not sure how I feel about that. In terms of history, I think it’s a shame to replace old with new unless it’s absolutely necessary.
Why replace a headstone? Was it done in loving reverence of a family member? Perhaps, but probably not. So why replace a marker for someone who died in, say, 1765. As Longfellow said:
Hardly a man is now alive
who remembers that famous day and year
Possibly it’s some poor misguided soul who thinks that an old marker is bad. However, there has to be a way of notating the information from the stone without replacing the original. Or maybe the stone was somehow broken and therefore replaced. There again, many stones in the cemeteries are broken and not replaced. So why this one particular stone here and that one particular stone there?
Here are three examples. All three are from about the same era. The first is original.
The second is a replacement, but the original look was kept.
The third is a very modern stone. 
If I have to accept a replacement, I’ll go with door number two. Thanks awfully.
It's My World 
Was that the cemetery at McAlevy’s Fort, Cathey? When I last visited, a lot of stones from the French & Indian War were stlll legible. At least they were in the early 1990’s. I had previously visited it around 1956.when a friend’s sister participated in Margaret Ferree’s social studies class project.
Duh. scrolling back up what do I see but a Macalevy tombstone. Uh, yeah. That practice is sort of anti-historical, in a sense.